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October 7, 2011
Is the Occupy Wall Street movement in the US an attempt to change the political climate in the US?
The political context is the failure of Washington to deliver economic recovery and the realization that the US political system is increasingly being run for the benefit of the financial elites on Wall Street.
There is an absence of proposals--eg., America needs Jobs--- within the movement in spite of a decade in which the American middle class shrank. More jobs are expected to be lost at worst; or not enough jobs created to keep up with normal population growth at best. Maybe the lack of demands is intentional.
Will Occupy Wall Street take a different tack to the Tea Party's recycling the standard right-wing set of demands--lowering taxes on the wealthy, reducing regulations on corporations, and cutting spending on the poor--by demanding repeal of the Bush tax cuts on the rich, stricter financial regulations, more stimulus spending, etc? Will Occupy Wall Street shape the debate over economic policy in the US about the growing inequality?
In the New York Times Paul Krugman outlines how outrageous the story of the US' economic woes is in three acts:
In the first act, bankers took advantage of deregulation to run wild (and pay themselves princely sums), inflating huge bubbles through reckless lending. In the second act, the bubbles burst — but bankers were bailed out by taxpayers, with remarkably few strings attached, even as ordinary workers continued to suffer the consequences of the bankers’ sins. And, in the third act, bankers showed their gratitude by turning on the people who had saved them, throwing their support — and the wealth they still possessed thanks to the bailouts — behind politicians who promised to keep their taxes low and dismantle the mild regulations erected in the aftermath of the crisis.
On the We are the 99 Percent blog we have the personal stories of people who have, seemingly, done everything right but are still struggling with debt, unemployment, and a stagnant future.
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Alas the halfwits in the MSM refuse to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, this is the start of something important.
http://www.creators.com/liberal/jim-hightower.html